The iPhone 6 Review
by Joshua Ho, Brandon Chester, Chris Heinonen & Ryan Smith on September 30, 2014 8:01 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Apple
- Mobile
- iPhone 6
GPU Performance
While we don't quite have real games to benchmark against, we do have benchmarks that are reasonably good approximations of games, which heavily stress the GPU. For the most part, this means that we can see the performance of the A8's PowerVR GX6450 GPU but there are some aspects that are CPU-bound, which we'll discuss after the results.
Edit: Before I get into the results, I must caution that Basemark X will have inaccurate on-screen results as the benchmark was made using XCode 5.x in order to keep scores comparable between versions 1.1 and 1.1.1. This doesn't affect the overall score, which is solely calculated based upon off-screen performance.
For the most part, we see that the GX6450 is at about the same level as Qualcomm's Adreno 420, which seems to track closely to expectations given that the A7's GPU was around the same performance as the Adreno 330. The 3DMark test does have an interesting result, but it seems that this is because 3DMark's physics test has a strong amount of data dependency that restricts the level of out of order execution that can be done. NVIDIA's Tegra K1 is the current leader in graphics performance, but of course it's also in a tablet instead of a smartphone so it's not a direct competitor.
NAND Performance
As we move towards the goal of seamless performance in everyday tasks, one significant factor is IO performance. While there's definitely a minimum level of performance that allows for generally acceptable smoothness, there's value in having higher storage performance (e.g. prevent bottlenecking in situations such as updating apps in the background). In order to test this, we use Androbench with some custom settings on Android and a custom utility developed by Eric Patno for iOS, who has been quite helpful with furthering our efforts to test storage performance.
As this is the first time that we've looked into NAND performance on iOS devices, it's definitely worth scrutinizing the data a bit more closely than in most cases. There are a few notable cases here, which are the class-leading speeds for sequential reads and writes on the iPhone 6, but also the rather middling random read and write speeds for the iPhone 6 and 5s. The oddest result is definitely the iPhone 5, which is Ryan's personal unit and while the random read speeds are on the low side, random write speeds are easily record-setting.
In practice, with tablets and smartphones being less multitasking heavy than PCs/laptops, the sequential scores are probably slightly more relevant to the overall user experience. The iPhone 6 results show a significant increase in performance over the iPhone 5s in all of the tests, which is always good to see.
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bobobobo - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
solid phone, solid improvement.AppleCrappleHater2 - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
Worship the holy apple.The apple way, selling over expensive crap to stupid consumers that like to
get robbed.
This has been a disastrous launch in every respect. The iwatch is such an
ugly piece of crap, it is truly unbelievable how a company, formerly known for
its remarkable design, dares to put out such a crap ton of shit. Some
characteristics are glaringly obvious and inherent to it: over expensive,
hardly innovative, limited functionality and usability (need of an iPhone to
make it work), looks exactly like a toy watch and so on.
There are of course way better smart watches out there, especially from the
likes of Samsung, Sony, Motorola, Asus, LG, simply put, there is no need for
another piece of over expensive junk.
The iPhone 6 is technologically stuck in pre-2011 times, a base model with
a capacity of 16GB without the possibility to use SD cards isn't even funny
anymore. The screen resolution is horrendous, it isn't water proof, shock and
dust resistant, it offers nothing innovative, just some incremental
updates over its predecessor, both lacking severely behind their competitors at
their respective launch dates.
Now the Iphone 6 Plus offers a „Retina HD“ screen, full 1920x1080p, oh wow,
where have you been for the past 4 years apple, talk about trailing behind.
That’s pathetic. The interesting thing about that is the fact that apple
always manages to sell backwards oriented, outdated crap to its user base, all
while pretending to be an innovative technology leader. The similarities
regarding any form of sectarian cult are striking.
You gotta love how Apple always comes up with new marketing bullshit terms,
aka "Retina HD", with the intention to manipulate its users while preventing easy
comparisons with its competitors by withholding the actual specs. Apparently it’s
not enough to have a 1080p screen, you have to call it "Retina HD" to make those
suckers buy it, otherwise someone could look at the 4K Amoled and Oled screens
form LG and Samsung devices and get outright disappointed. Same goes for
everything else. Every outdated „feature“ needs to get its own marketing label
to persuade buyers with crappy „experience“ and „usability“ ads, while covering
the truth with marketing gibberish, knowing full well that only a fraction of
aforementioned buyers cares to look at the facts and dares to compare them.
Car engines come to mind. For comparisons shake let’s look at a 1.0 liter, turbo
charged petrol engine and a V8 compressor. What’s better should be obvious, but
by calling the former an „ecobooster“, thus giving it a special marketing label,
this joke becomes a „feature“, something positive that can be added tot the list
of features of a car.
By doing so a negative aspect is transformed into a positive one, the
reality is distorted, non tech savvy buyers are manipulated and comparisons are
made more difficult (another layer of marketing bullshit to overcome), well done
marketing department. You see , if something is seriously lacking (of course for
profit, what else), don’t bother explaining, just give it a nice marketing term, distort
reality, make it a feature and call it a day. Fuck that!!
FACT: Apple has been forced to copy Android in style and size for
years because people abandoned their tired, moribund and fossilized
devices for superior and innovative Android devices.
Steve Jobs said no one should want a 7" tablet until everyone went and bought
Android devices forcing Apple to copycat with the iPad Mini. Apple
didn't think anyone wanted a phone screen larger than a business card
until they all bought Androids thus forcing the arrival this week of the
iPhone Galaxy and iPhone Galaxy Note clone phones.
Swipe down notifications that don't interfere? Copied from Android and WebOS. Siri?
Bought and ruined from a private developer; Google Now crushes it.
3rd-party keyboards? Welcome to 2010, iChumps! Widgets? Welcome to 2009
except you can't place them on your home screen. Live wallpapers and
hidden icons? Maybe Apple will get around to copying those in iOS X in
2016. Who knows.
Apple lacks creativity and honest people acknowledge it. Steve Jobs gets credited as an
innovator when all he was, was a huckster who'd spot someone else's tech, polish it up nicely,
then slap a gnawed fruit logo on the back, charge a premium price and
wait for the rubes like Jim Smith to hand over their cash like the good
iSheep they are.
But after that initial iteration, Apple is incapable of actually innovating something new.
They literally cannot make a product until someone else shows them how and they copy it.
They are also unable refine things because they believe to improve is to
admit something was imperfect the first time. (This is why QuickTime 4
had a legendarily terrible UI that was never changed through QT7 a
decade later.) All they can do is make things incrementally thinner or
faster but it's just minor refinements since they can't invest their way
out of a wet paper bag.
For all their squealing about Retina displays, they never even had a HD display until now;
8th time is the charm, though you need the iPhone Galaxy Note to get the 1080p that many Android
users have had for at least a year and is now considered
bare-minimum spec. At the rate Apple drags along, QHD screens should
arrive in 2018. Maybe. A graphic went around after the reveal comparing
the iPhone Galaxy to the Nexus 4 from 2012. Exactly.
The Apple Iphone 1 and Ipad 1 might have been innovative at their time,
but since then, the bitten apple has been continuously rotting from the inside
outwards, always swarmed by millions of Iworms which regale themselves with its
rotten flesh, not forgetting all other Americans who support apple by means of
their tax dollars to finance its bought US Treasury/Government bond interest rates.
Last but not least, every Apple product includes a direct hotlink to the NSA,
free of charge, something that might make it a good value, after all.
Ceterum censeo Applem esse delendam.
esterhasz - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
Since we're quoting Cato today, here's a good one: "grasp the subject, the words will follow".uhuznaa - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
You seem to be a tiny bit obsessed.iphone6splus - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
Yet, he didn't comment on Touch ID.kevin_newell - Thursday, October 9, 2014 - link
Apple is lagging far behind it's competitors both in user satisfaction (source: http://www.consumertop.com/best-phone-guide/) and innovation. I mean, who was first with large screens and phone cameras that work well in low light? It sure wasn't Apple.Caliko - Tuesday, October 6, 2015 - link
A large iPhone is NOT innovation.Sorry iPhoney fan.
lowtolerance - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
I can recommend some good therapists. You need one.melgross - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
You sir, are a complete idiot!Gondalf - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
To be fair, a >$600 phone deserves a good LCD.....at least good as competitors, more ram and a little SD expansion slot. Plain and simple. This is not a matter of "idiocy"